This invention relates to a charging arrangement for the time-controlled charging of at least one rechargeable cell, comprising a supply device which enables a charging current to be supplied to the at least one rechargeable cell, a switching device which enables the charging current supplied to the at least one rechargeable cell to be started and stopped, and a control device provided to control the switching device and comprising a time signal generation stage which, expiration of a time interval after the beginning of a charging current supply, supplies a time signal which controls the switching device so as to stop the supply of charging current.
A charging arrangement of the type defined in the opening paragraph is known in different variants and is described in, for example, the February 1988 issue of the Dutch magazine "Elektuur", pages 74 to 79. In the known circuit arrangements the time signal generation stage supplies the time signal to terminate a charging current supply to a rechargeable cell upon the expiration of a time interval after the beginning of a charging current supply, which time interval may be adjustable by hand but otherwise always remains the same. Consequently, all of the charging operations are ended after a given constant charging time. The charging time may be, for example, eight hours, and the charging current may then have a value between 0.1 C and 0.3 C. By means of the known charging arrangements nickel-cadmium batteries (NiCd batteries), whose charging characteristics are substantially independent of the ambient temperature, can be charged without any problems but this is not so in the case of batteries such as nickel-metal-hydride batteries (NiMH batteries), whose charging characteristics depend comparatively strongly on the ambient temperature.